- -
- 100%
- +
"I mean," the coroner exclaimed, evidently nettled that the young man had been able to draw such a conclusion from his words, "that you were the last one to see him previous to his assassination by some unknown individual?"
The secretary folded his arms, whether to hide a certain tremble which had seized him, or by that simple action to gain time for a moment's further thought, I could not then determine. "Sir," he replied at length, "I cannot answer yes or no to that question. In all probability I was the last to see him in good health and spirits, but in a house as large as this I cannot be sure of even so simple a fact as that." Then, observing the unsatisfied look on the faces around, added slowly, "It is my business to see him late."
"Your business? Oh, as his secretary, I suppose?"
He gravely nodded.
"Mr. Harwell," the coroner went on, "the office of private secretary in this country is not a common one. Will you explain to us what your duties were in that capacity; in short, what use Mr. Leavenworth had for such an assistant and how he employed you?"
"Certainly. Mr. Leavenworth was, as you perhaps know, a man of great wealth. Connected with various societies, clubs, institutions, etc., besides being known far and near as a giving man, he was accustomed every day of his life to receive numerous letters, begging and otherwise, which it was my business to open and answer, his private correspondence always bearing a mark upon it which distinguished it from the rest. But this was not all I was expected to do. Having in his early life been engaged in the tea-trade, he had made more than one voyage to China, and was consequently much interested in the question of international communication between that country and our own. Thinking that in his various visits there, he had learned much which, if known to the American people, would conduce to our better understanding of the nation, its peculiarities, and the best manner of dealing with it, he has been engaged for some time in writing a book on the subject, which same it has been my business for the last eight months to assist him in preparing, by writing at his dictation three hours out of the twenty-four, the last hour being commonly taken from the evening, say from half-past nine to half-past ten, Mr. Leavenworth being a very methodical man and accustomed to regulate his own life and that of those about him with almost mathematical precision."
"You say you were accustomed to write at his dictation evenings? Did you do this as usual last evening?"
"I did, sir."
"What can you tell us of his manner and appearance at the time? Were they in any way unusual?"
A frown crossed the secretary's brow.
"As he probably had no premonition of his doom, why should there have been any change in his manner?"
This giving the coroner an opportunity to revenge himself for his discomfiture of a moment before, he said somewhat severely:
"It is the business of a witness to answer questions, not to put them."
The secretary flushed and the account stood even.
"Very well, then, sir; if Mr. Leavenworth felt any forebodings of his end, he did not reveal them to me. On the contrary, he seemed to be more absorbed in his work than usual. One of the last words he said to me was, 'In a month we will have this book in press, eh, Trueman?' I remember this particularly, as he was filling his wine-glass at the time. He always drank one glass of wine before retiring, it being my duty to bring the decanter of sherry from the closet the last thing before leaving him. I was standing with my hand on the knob of the hall-door, but advanced as he said this and replied, 'I hope so, indeed, Mr. Leavenworth.' 'Then join me in drinking a glass of sherry,' said he, motioning me to procure another glass from the closet. I did so, and he poured me out the wine with his own hand. I am not especially fond of sherry, but the occasion was a pleasant one and I drained my glass. I remember being slightly ashamed of doing so, for Mr. Leavenworth set his down half full. It was half full when we found him this morning."
Do what he would, and being a reserved man he appeared anxious to control his emotion, the horror of his first shock seemed to overwhelm him here. Pulling his handkerchief from his pocket, he wiped his forehead. "Gentlemen, that is the last action of Mr. Leavenworth I ever saw. As he set the glass down on the table, I said good-night to him and left the room."
The coroner, with a characteristic imperviousness to all expressions of emotion, leaned back and surveyed the young man with a scrutinizing glance. "And where did you go then?" he asked.
"To my own room."
"Did you meet anybody on the way?"
"No, sir."
"Hear any thing or see anything unusual?"
The secretary's voice fell a trifle. "No, sir."
"Mr. Harwell, think again. Are you ready to swear that you neither met anybody, heard anybody, nor saw anything which lingers yet in your memory as unusual?"
His face grew quite distressed. Twice he opened his lips to speak, and as often closed them without doing so. At last, with an effort, he replied:
"I saw one thing, a little thing, too slight to mention, but it was unusual, and I could not help thinking of it when you spoke."
"What was it?"
"Only a door half open."
"Whose door?"
"Miss Eleanore Leavenworth's." His voice was almost a whisper now.
"Where were you when you observed this fact?"
"I cannot say exactly. Probably at my own door, as I did not stop on the way. If this frightful occurrence had not taken place I should never have thought of it again."
"When you went into your room did you close your door?"
"I did, sir."
"How soon did you retire?"
"Immediately."
"Did you hear nothing before you fell asleep?"
Again that indefinable hesitation.
"Barely nothing."
"Not a footstep in the hall?"
"I might have heard a footstep."
"Did you?"
"I cannot swear I did."
"Do you think you did?"
"Yes, I think I did. To tell the whole: I remember hearing, just as I was falling into a doze, a rustle and a footstep in the hall; but it made no impression upon me, and I dropped asleep."
"Well?"
"Some time later I woke, woke suddenly, as if something had startled me, but what, a noise or move, I cannot say. I remember rising up in my bed and looking around, but hearing nothing further, soon yielded to the drowsiness which possessed me and fell into a deep sleep. I did not wake again till morning."
Here requested to relate how and when he became acquainted with the fact of the murder, he substantiated, in all particulars, the account of the matter already given by the butler; which subject being exhausted, the coroner went on to ask if he had noted the condition of the library table after the body had been removed.
"Somewhat; yes, sir."
"What was on it?"
"The usual properties, sir, books, paper, a pen with the ink dried on it, besides the decanter and the wineglass from which he drank the night before."
"Nothing more?"
"I remember nothing more."
"In regard to that decanter and glass," broke in the juryman of the watch and chain, "did you not say that the latter was found in the same condition in which you saw it at the time you left Mr. Leavenworth sitting in his library?"
"Yes, sir, very much."
"Yet he was in the habit of drinking a full glass?"
"Yes, sir."
"An interruption must then have ensued very close upon your departure, Mr. Harwell."
A cold bluish pallor suddenly broke out upon the young man's face. He started, and for a moment looked as if struck by some horrible thought. "That does not follow, sir," he articulated with some difficulty. "Mr. Leavenworth might—" but suddenly stopped, as if too much distressed to proceed.
"Go on, Mr. Harwell, let us hear what you have to say."
"There is nothing," he returned faintly, as if battling with some strong emotion.
As he had not been answering a question, only volunteering an explanation, the coroner let it pass; but I saw more than one pair of eyes roll suspiciously from side to side, as if many there felt that some sort of clue had been offered them in this man's emotion. The coroner, ignoring in his easy way both the emotion and the universal excitement it had produced, now proceeded to ask: "Do you know whether the key to the library was in its place when you left the room last night?"
"No, sir; I did not notice."
"The presumption is, it was?"
"I suppose so."
"At all events, the door was locked in the morning, and the key gone?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then whoever committed this murder locked the door on passing out, and took away the key?"
"It would seem so."
The coroner turning, faced the jury with an earnest look. "Gentlemen," said he, "there seems to be a mystery in regard to this key which must be looked into."
Immediately a universal murmur swept through the room, testifying to the acquiescence of all present. The little juryman hastily rising proposed that an instant search should be made for it; but the coroner, turning upon him with what I should denominate as a quelling look, decided that the inquest should proceed in the usual manner, till the verbal testimony was all in.
"Then allow me to ask a question," again volunteered the irrepressible. "Mr. Harwell, we are told that upon the breaking in of the library door this morning, Mr. Leavenworth's two nieces followed you into the room."
"One of them, sir, Miss Eleanore."
"Is Miss Eleanore the one who is said to be Mr. Leavenworth's sole heiress?" the coroner here interposed.
"No, sir, that is Miss Mary."
"That she gave orders," pursued the juryman, "for the removal of the body into the further room?"
"Yes, sir."
"And that you obeyed her by helping to carry it in?"
"Yes, sir."
"Now, in thus passing through the rooms, did you observe anything to lead you to form a suspicion of the murderer?"
The secretary shook his head. "I have no suspicion," he emphatically said.
Somehow, I did not believe him. Whether it was the tone of his voice, the clutch of his hand on his sleeve—and the hand will often reveal more than the countenance—I felt that this man was not to be relied upon in making this assertion.
"I should like to ask Mr. Harwell a question," said a juryman who had not yet spoken. "We have had a detailed account of what looks like the discovery of a murdered man. Now, murder is never committed without some motive. Does the secretary know whether Mr. Leavenworth had any secret enemy?"
"I do not."
"Every one in the house seemed to be on good terms with him?"
"Yes, sir," with a little quaver of dissent in the assertion, however.
"Not a shadow lay between him and any other member of his household, so far as you know?"
"I am not ready to say that," he returned, quite distressed. "A shadow is a very slight thing. There might have been a shadow——"
"Between him and whom?"
A long hesitation. "One of his nieces, sir."
"Which one?"
Again that defiant lift of the head. "Miss Eleanore."
"How long has this shadow been observable?"
"I cannot say."
"You do not know the cause?"
"I do not."
"Nor the extent of the feeling?"
"No, sir."
"You open Mr. Leavenworth's letters?"
"I do."
"Has there been anything in his correspondence of late calculated to throw any light upon this deed?"
It actually seemed as if he never would answer. Was he simply pondering over his reply, or was the man turned to stone?
"Mr. Harwell, did you hear the juryman?" inquired the coroner.
"Yes, sir; I was thinking."
"Very well, now answer."
"Sir," he replied, turning and looking the juryman full in the face, and in that way revealing his unguarded left hand to my gaze, "I have opened Mr. Leavenworth's letters as usual for the last two weeks, and I can think of nothing in them bearing in the least upon this tragedy."
The man lied; I knew it instantly. The clenched hand pausing irresolute, then making up its mind to go through with the lie firmly, was enough for me.
"Mr. Harwell, this is undoubtedly true according to your judgment," said the coroner; "but Mr. Leavenworth's correspondence will have to be searched for all that."
"Of course," he replied carelessly; "that is only right."
This remark ended Mr. Harwell's examination for the time. As he sat down I made note of four things.
That Mr. Harwell himself, for some reason not given, was conscious of a suspicion which he was anxious to suppress even from his own mind.
That a woman was in some way connected with it, a rustle as well as a footstep having been heard by him on the stairs.
That a letter had arrived at the house, which if found would be likely to throw some light upon this subject.
That Eleanore Leavenworth's name came with difficulty from his lips; this evidently unimpressible man, manifesting more or less emotion whenever he was called upon to utter it.